You Have Your Mother's Eyes
by SoothemySoul
Summary: After years of hearing their mother's stories of her grandfather and his mysterious TARDIS, Barbara and Ian Campbell decide to build one and have adventures of their own. How will they do it? Where will their travels take them? WHO will they meet along the way?
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: _Doctor Who _and all associated characters are property of BBC. I own nothing but imagination and a sonic.**

"Mother, will you tell us a story? About the TARDIS?"

Before the woman could speak, a teenage boy sighed loudly. "We're sixteen now, Barb. We're much too old for stories."

Barbara rolled her eyes at her twin brother. "Fine. Mother, will you tell me a story about the TARDIS?" The boy made a face at her from his place across the room. "Mother!"

"Ian, be nice to your sister," said their mother who looked no older than sixteen herself. Susan Campbell pushed her hair back as she sorted through some memories. "I'm sorry Barbara, I just can't seem to think of any new ones. You already know about the Daleks and the giants and the explosion and-"

"Explosion?" Ian said, his interest now piqued. "You've never mentioned an explosion!"

"No? Are you sure?" she asked.

"Quite!" replied Barbara with an emphatic nod. "Surely we'd remember an explosion!"

"Hmm. David dear?" Mrs. Campbell turned to the blonde man leaning against the wall. "Don't you remember the TARDIS explosion story? The children appear to have forgotten."

"Of course I do," her husband said, joining her game. "But the children have school in the morning so I'm afraid-"

"Oh please tell us, Mother, please!"

"Yes, please, Mother!"

"Oh very well. It all started when Grandfather tried to fix the navigation circuits on the ship."

"That's what caused it to land wrong all the time, isn't it?" Ian interjected.

"Don't interrupt!" Barbara scolded. "And anyway you shouldn't be listening, you're too old for stories, you said so yourself."

"I was talking to Mother, you...you...Dalek!"

She gasped and whipped her head to the side. "Father, did you hear what he called me?"

"Apologize to your sister this instant Ian," said Mr. Campbell sternly.

He bowed his head contritely. "I'm sorry." She stuck her tongue out. "Please finish the story, Mother?"

She narrowed her eyes at her son and looked to her daughter. She nodded realizing the problem was over. "Alright, where was I?"

"Navigation circuit."

"Yes, of course. Well, there was an explosion and we were all knocked out. I think Miss Wright- Barbara- was the first to come to, she woke me up and I remember seeing Grandfather on the floor. I thought something was controlling the TARDIS and I tried to attack Miss Wright and Mr. Chesterton."

"That's who I'm named for, right?"

"Right. We- Grandfather and I- thought that they had something to do with the malfunction because they were trying to get back to London."

"Because the Doctor had taken them, right?"

"That's right," Mrs. Campbell said with a nod to Barbara. "And the clocks melted...there was another explosion just after the fault locator went absolutely mad, indicating problems with all the systems. Miss Wright thought that perhaps it was the ship trying to wan us and that was when Grandfather found the broken spring."

"But why would that make it go chumpy?" Ian asked.

"Well, you see, the spring was in the fast return switch and that would take it back through time. And since there was no previous place to go, the TARDIS would have gone to a solar system creation. It was trying to warn us that we were in danger." Barbara gasped. "But it's alright! Grandfather was able to fix it and we made amends with Miss Wright and Mr. Chesterton, so it ended well."

"Oh, good!"

"And now," said Mr. Campbell, "you two had best be off to bed, you have exams."

The children said their goodnights and went to bed. Barbara fell asleep almost immediately, but across the hall, Ian was deep in thought. Their mother had been telling them stories of this strange box, able to travel to any place in time and anywhere in space, and its stranger pilot for as long as he could remember. In spite of the stories and his research, he knew nothing about either. He was awake for hours before an idea slowly manifested. And the longer he pondered, the better it seemed. Almost on autopilot, he got out of bed and found himself tiptoeing to his sister's room. "Barb," he whispered. She stirred, but did not wake up. "Barbara!" The girl turned to her side. Ian shook her vigorously, still saying her name as loudly as he dared.

"What?"

"Shh!"

"What?" she repeated in a softer tone.

"Let's build a TARDIS!"

Barbara sat up straighter. She rubbed her eyes and shook her head, then blinked at her twin, even leaning closer to him as if to hear him better. "What?"

"Let's build a TARDIS." Before she could say anything, he continued hurriedly. "We can do it! We're both in the top of our classes, you're some sort of savant when it comes to biology, and I can hack into any sort of system. I'm sure the materials would be easy enough to find and anything we can't buy we could probably make. "Oh think of it, Bar, think of the adventures! We could see the mountains of Felspoon or go to Gallifrey or- or-"

"Or Eye of Orion!" She began feeling excited by the thought of seeing the planets from astronomy class.

"Yes! Or even see the Doctor!"

"But how long would that take?" Reason kicked in as she considered just how wild her brother's plan was. "I mean, our block replica took ages and that was just the basic shape!"

"We were five, we didn't know anything. Let's see, we'll need a chameleon circuit, I can look around some shops for that, some sort of biometric system, a few-"

"Wait, wait!" Barbara got up to rummage through her nightstand drawer. After finding her holotab, she returned to the bed sitting across from Ian and powered on the device. "Now you'll get the circuit right? And what was next?"

"Biometric system. For security. And Mother said the box was alive-"

"-so we'll need matter. Organic matter." She tapped her finger against her leg for a moment. "I can probably get that from the laboratory tomorrow." She swiped a few things across the screen. "And it's bigger on the inside, how can we do that?"

"I think that's called...I remember that from last month at school, it's transcendental something? Dimensionally transcendental!"

"Of course!"

By sunrise, they had a screen filled with a materials list, several formulas, and a tentative timeline of three weeks. Before parting ways to dress for school, they made a secrecy pact and sealed it with a hand signal of their own invention and their sacred promise. "Mother musn't know, Father musn't know, we swear on Rassilion's Sash."


	2. Chapter 2

"I need a console."

"Just like that then? You never call, you never write, now you're wanting something? I don't like it, mate. Don't like it one bit."

Ian raised an eyebrow. "You done?" His friend nodded. "So that console."

"Alright, demanding parasite. What sort?"

"Circular, cathedral ceiling to floor, controls about waist high, multidirectional, everything proof, maybe five feet round."

The other boy nodded. "How soon?"

"Next week."

"I'll see what I can do then."

"Thanks, man."

He waved him away, mumbling something about graphene and amazonium diamonds.

Meanwhile, Barbara was making progress of her own at school. "Now how would a biocontrol system work for people with similar DNA?"

"How do you mean?" asked her biology teacher.

"Well, let's take iris scanning and siblings. That's fine for one person, but suppose someone else needed to get in but maybe the first person is unconscious? Is it possible to use the same system for multiple persons or would one have to use one system per person?"

Mr. Hotch scratched his chin as he thought over her questions. "Well...what did you say this was for again?"

"It's just a research paper for another class," she said, thankful for all those late night poker lessons.

"I see. To be perfectly honest, Miss Campbell, you're making this much more difficult than necessary." She frowned. "Why not use cellular extraction?"

"Cellular extraction?" Her mouth dropped open in sudden realization and she slapped her forehead. "Cellular extraction, of course! Then insert it into the protoplasm probably and- oh, thank you sir!" She ran out of the room, leaving a bewildered Mr. Hotch.

For the first time since learning free period could be skipped without consequences, she stayed, using the time to sketch possible time machine designs. When the bell rang, she had a grand total of two rectangles surrounded by dimensions. Barbara gathered her things and followed the few students remaining out the door, making a mental note to convince an art student to draw something for her. On the way to the weekly mid-day assembly, she was joined by Ian. "And where have you been today?"

"Out," he replied. She raised an eyebrow. "Hey, that's my thing!"

"No seriously, where were you?"

"We're going to be able to steer the machine now."

"Oh goody!"

"It's gonna be useless unless we can, you know, get the thing working."

"We can. Trust me, we definitely can."

"How exactly?"

"Cellular extraction."

Ian opened his mouth to argue against the idea, then he closed it again. "That could actually work," he said after a moment. "Why didn't we think of that?"

"See how useful teachers can be?"

"Did the teacher tell you how to go about it?"

"Well, no, but-"

"How's that useful then?"

"-I've done trials before, it's not that difficult. Unpleasant side effects, but the upside is most of them only last about an hour."

"How unpleasant we talking?"

"Anything from extreme exhaustion and lethargy to nausea."

"And?"

The ends of her hair became highly interesting. "And? What 'and', did I mention any sort of 'and'?"

"But there is one, isn't there? Worse than nausea." She nodded reluctantly. "Spill."

"In very, very, very, very, very rare cases, there has been...two subjects have...the rarest of tests have resulted in...well"- she cleared her throat- "death."


End file.
